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Off Topic Thread 5.0

[Deleted User]

Thread continued from here https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2057835955&page=250

The usual rules apply. Non-rugby talk here. Consider this a social place, but like a pub, things like religion and politics can be divisive, so don't say things here you wouldn't say to someone's face in the pub. Sober

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aloooof

This is brilliant:

https://twitter.com/SportTG4/status/1303355159846690818

[Deleted User]

Deleted User wrote: »

Do you remember this guy from Prometheus? His entire existence was only to do stupid **** to move the plot along. He was apparently one of those maverick scientists who plays by his own rules and doesn't listen to anyone. The originals didn't have anything like that.

I haven't seen this film for a long time but is he the guy who runs off into the tunnels by himself just because? That was so dumb. The entire film was so dumb.

[Deleted User]

I know this has been talk about at length but I find the normalizing of just not giving a **** about anything by this UK govt to be fairly terrifying. Lie, cheat, break the law, enrich themselves, be massive hypocrites, appoint chums to the HoL, they just do not give a ****. Not even trying to hide it, it is brazen. The only one who seems to have suffered any consequence for anything was Rees-Mogg for suggesting the Grenfell victims were some way to blame for not getting out, and he was just sidelined for a while.

Paul Smeenus

FACECUTTR wrote: »

New Alien movie confirmed by Ridley Scott. More than likely moving away from Prometheus and Covenant. Hope they go back to something like the first 2 beauts.

I think the issue is they need to do something new cinematically. They've gotten caught up in explaining where the aliens came from and ladling the films with A-level philosophy, trying to Give Them Meaning.

Create some great characters, mix sci-fi with another genre, off you go. Be more creative in the actual plot and story than expending energy on tracing the history of Weyland-Yutani or whatever.

prawnsambo

Interested Observer wrote: »

I know this has been talk about at length but I find the normalizing of just not giving a **** about anything by this UK govt to be fairly terrifying. Lie, cheat, break the law, enrich themselves, be massive hypocrites, appoint chums to the HoL, they just do not give a ****. Not even trying to hide it, it is brazen. The only one who seems to have suffered any consequence for anything was Rees-Mogg for suggesting the Grenfell victims were some way to blame for not getting out, and he was just sidelined for a while.

It's basically copying the Trump playbook. Gaslight the nation with a cheerleading press to help and you can do anything you want. Not having a written constitution helps, but you have to have a neck like a jockey's proverbials to carry it off. But like Trump (hopefully) it will all come to grief if the economy tanks. And I can see no way with the current situation where the economy doesn't tank.

Neil3030

My main concern with a hard brexit is whether mfceiling can still get dodgy labourers down from the North to work for cash?

prawnsambo

So the Brits are at it again. The new bill has been published and you only have to get to section 2 before you run out of expletives.

2. The mutual recognition principle for goods
(1) The mutual recognition principle for goods is the principle that goods which—
(a) have been produced in, or imported into, one part of the United Kingdom (“the originating part”), and
(b) can lawfully be sold there, because the goods comply with the relevant requirements that would apply to their sale (or there are no such requirements), should be able to be sold in any other part of the United Kingdom, free from any relevant requirements that would otherwise apply to the sale.

Not even being subtle about it. F*ck the single market in other words.

Neil3030

prawnsambo wrote: »

So the Brits are at it again. The new bill has been published and you only have to get to section 2 before you run out of expletives.

Not even being subtle about it. F*ck the single market in other words.

Could you break this down?

errlloyd

Neil3030 wrote: »

Could you break this down?

It basically confirms that there can be no customs between Northern Ireland the rest of the UK. And therefore confirms that there HAS to be customs between the Republic and the North.

prawnsambo

Neil3030 wrote: »

Could you break this down?

The way I'm reading it, anything you import/produce etc. in one part of the UK can be sold in any other part of the UK. Without any other restriction than exists in the UK as a whole.

So the UK lowers food standards. In England or wherever. Import from a third country food that 'meets' that new standard. That can now be sold in any other part of the UK (including NI).

prawnsambo

There's more that Steve Peers has covered here

Neil3030

prawnsambo wrote: »

The way I'm reading it, anything you import/produce etc. in one part of the UK can be sold in any other part of the UK. Without any other restriction than exists in the UK as a whole.

So the UK lowers food standards. In England or wherever. Import from a third country food that 'meets' that new standard. That can now be sold in any other part of the UK (including NI).

So I presume this wasn't allowed in the withdrawal agreement?

molloyjh

Neil3030 wrote: »

So I presume this wasn't allowed in the withdrawal agreement?

Not only that, but it breaches the GFA AFAIK. It forces there to be a border on the island of Ireland, which was the whole issue that the WA apparently resolved.

Not that anyone can be at all surprised by any of this. Boris himself was very clear in saying at the time the WA was agreed that there would be no border between NI and the rest of the UK. We all laughed thinking "of course there will". Meanwhile he was laughing thinking "they dont actually expect us to honour the WA do they?".

[Deleted User]

WA?

[Deleted User]

Pretty serious turn alright but not entirely unsurprising. The more brexit interacts with the reality the more the UK Government will need to engage in fantasy solutions such as this.

It has to be brinkmanship. They have to be aware on some level that the consequences of this are far more problematic than the problems the WA causes for them. I hope this is a last gasp to try and force the EU into a compromise they can sell to voters, but if that's the case it's remarkably stupid as I expect the EU may now just disengage from the negotiations.

Brexit was either going to get nixed somewhere along the way or it was going to reach a foolish, costly and embarrassing conclusion like this.

You would have to think there will be no deal now - which means business takes another savage blow in Ireland and other parts of the EU. This won't be forgiven, England will be a pariah state.

[Deleted User]

Deleted User wrote: »

WA?

Withdrawal Agreement.

prawnsambo

Deleted User wrote: »

Pretty serious turn alright but not entirely unsurprising. The more brexit interacts with the reality the more the UK Government will need to engage in fantasy solutions such as this.

It has to be brinkmanship. They have to be aware on some level that the consequences of this are far more problematic than the problems the WA causes for them. I hope this is a last gasp to try and force the EU into a compromise they can sell to voters, but if that's the case it's remarkably stupid as I expect the EU may now just disengage from the negotiations.

Brexit was either going to get nixed somewhere along the way or it was going to reach a foolish, costly and embarrassing conclusion like this.

You would have to think there will be no deal now - which means business takes another savage blow in Ireland and other parts of the EU. This won't be forgiven, England will be a pariah state.

It's basically "We were playing on the playstation and didn't do our homework, so now that we've no time left to do it, we're not going to do any of the hard stuff at all. Here's our note Teacher."

Neil3030

I hopefully come in peace with this question - but should Scotland leave the UK, how would the two camps in NI feel about joining them as a micro-Union, if it could remain in the EU?

On the Unionist side, you didn't unify Ireland, and there's probably strongest cultural links between NI Unionists and Scotland, than anywhere else in the UK.
On the Nationalist side, NI is no longer in the UK and still in the EU/synergised politically with the South.

Could both sides claim a win?

prawnsambo

Neil3030 wrote: »

I hopefully come in peace with this question - but should Scotland leave the UK, how would the two camps in NI feel about joining them as a micro-Union, if it could remain in the EU?

On the Unionist side, you didn't unify Ireland, and there's probably strongest cultural links between NI Unionists and Scotland, than anywhere else in the UK.
On the Nationalist side, NI is no longer in the UK and still in the EU/synergised politically with the South.

Could both sides claim a win?

Hopefully? You don't know?

All I could say is that it's a novel way of tearing up the GFA.

Neil3030

prawnsambo wrote: »

Hopefully? You don't know?

All I could say is that it's a novel way of tearing up the GFA.

s/come in peace/don't spark a sh*t show/

[Deleted User]

Neil3030 wrote: »

I hopefully come in peace with this question - but should Scotland leave the UK, how would the two camps in NI feel about joining them as a micro-Union, if it could remain in the EU?

On the Unionist side, you didn't unify Ireland, and there's probably strongest cultural links between NI Unionists and Scotland, than anywhere else in the UK.
On the Nationalist side, NI is no longer in the UK and still in the EU/synergised politically with the South.

Could both sides claim a win?

It's an interesting concept but ultimately Ireland is not big enough to be two separate countries without hobbling one or either of those countries. Having NI and Scotland form a Union would just replicate some of the same issues we have now.

Demographics and cultural influence will gradually see Northern Ireland homogenise with Ireland (already happening a lot), but given how severely England is ****ting the bed it's entirely possible that this process will be accelerated.

Neil3030

Precedent: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D%C3%A1l_Riata

Paul Smeenus

What you're doing is arguing it might work because both sides could argue they "hadn't lost".

While that outlook is a pretty fair reflection of our politicians and often our wider political institutions, the actual people here are not going to be mollified simply because "them'uns didn't get what they wanted."

Paul Smeenus

Deleted User wrote: »

It's an interesting concept but ultimately Ireland is not big enough to be two separate countries without hobbling one or either of those countries. Having NI and Scotland form a Union would just replicate some of the same issues we have now.

Demographics and cultural influence will gradually see Northern Ireland homogenise with Ireland (already happening a lot), but given how severely England is ****ting the bed it's entirely possible that this process will be accelerated.

More than accelerated, it has supercharged how important unification is. What Brexit has done is take the considerable numbers of middle class Catholics/Nationalists who were happy that the GFA allowed them to identify as Irish but weren't too pro-actively seeking or worrying about unification, and make them concerned enough that a United Ireland is a priority. In fact, there are quite a few soft Unionists who feel that being in a United Ireland as part of Europe is better than going down with the sinking ship of post Brexit Britain.

Squidgy Black

Paul Smeenus wrote: »

More than accelerated, it has supercharged how important unification is. What Brexit has done is take the considerable numbers of middle class Catholics/Nationalists who were happy that the GFA allowed them to identify as Irish but weren't too pro-actively seeking or worrying about unification, and make them concerned enough that a United Ireland is a priority. In fact, there are quite a few soft Unionists who feel that being in a United Ireland as part of Europe is better than going down with the sinking ship of post Brexit Britain.

I was chatting to an ex-colleague of mine from Rathcoole just after the original vote and he'd sworn on his life he wouldn't be getting an Irish passport and this would be the best thing since sliced bread for the North.

Found out last week he's gotten his Irish passport and is looking at a shift down to the Dublin office as the Belfast office is looking like it's gonna go tits up.

Regardless of opinions on picking sides etc, it's sort of sad in a way that there's people who've spent their life identifying with a nation/flag who's government have turned around when it's inconvenient to them and basically said you're lesser than the mainland and we'll willingly put you in harm's way to get our goals over the line. No more than if the Irish government turned around to the UK and said close the border it's fine with us.

Dave_The_Sheep

Deleted User wrote: »

It has to be brinkmanship. They have to be aware on some level that the consequences of this are far more problematic than the problems the WA causes for them. I hope this is a last gasp to try and force the EU into a compromise they can sell to voters, but if that's the case it's remarkably stupid as I expect the EU may now just disengage from the negotiations.

If the EU does pander to them, I'm going to be very disappointed. I suspect they will though, there's enough money at stake. At this stage I just hope the UK gets a f*cking kicking, even though we'll get our share of pain as well. Tired of it all.

Podge_irl

Dave_The_Sheep wrote: »

If the EU does pander to them, I'm going to be very disappointed. I suspect they will though, there's enough money at stake. At this stage I just hope the UK gets a f*cking kicking, even though we'll get our share of pain as well. Tired of it all.

They won’t. The EU, above all else, just loves its rules. They simply cannot allow this kind of crass behaviour to be rewarded at all. Breaking off talks completely is more likely than any kind of acquiescence.

[Deleted User]

Dave_The_Sheep wrote: »

If the EU does pander to them, I'm going to be very disappointed. I suspect they will though, there's enough money at stake. At this stage I just hope the UK gets a f*cking kicking, even though we'll get our share of pain as well. Tired of it all.

I think the EU will move on fish and the UK will move on state aid.

Fish has been turned into a political issue by the British right wing media but there are plenty of ways that an agreement can be made that retains the current status quo whilst giving an impression that 'England' has won in that debate. State Aid is a more complicated matter but I get the sense that the compromise narrative is being tee'd up to satisfy low information voters in England.

They get fish (worth virtually nothing to the economy) but state aid rules in the UK are aligned with the EU and subject to European courts jurisdiction.

That's where I think it's going, but there is a lot of noise at the moment and an incredibly dishonest Government in the UK so who knows.

Dave_The_Sheep

Deleted User wrote: »

... whilst giving an impression that 'England' has won in that debate. State Aid is a more complicated matter but I get the sense that the compromise narrative is being tee'd up to satisfy low information voters in England.

I think this is the bit that the weary part of me is sick of. The realistic part of me gets that this is the way it has to work, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't want them to get nothing to brag about to their idiot voters. It's all a bit sickening.

I realise yeah, I wouldn't have the patience to be dealing with this crowd.

Neil3030

It strikes me that the state aid will be much more important to the UK going forward. Especially if any part of the post Brexit plan is to attract new industry, e.g., tech to the country.